Gym website where the timetable is the homepage

The information people want is in a PDF from 2023

Ask anyone who is thinking about joining a gym what they want to know and it is the same two things. What is on, and when. Not the philosophy, not the equipment list, not the founder's competition record.

Yet the timetable is almost always the worst maintained thing on a gym website. A PDF that downloads instead of opening, an image of a spreadsheet, or a page that says see our app. All three are a way of telling someone that finding out is going to be work, and most of them decide not to bother.

For combat sports there is a second barrier on top, and it is the real one. Somebody who has never done it is not worried about the timetable, they are worried about walking into a room of people who all know each other and getting hurt in front of them. Nothing on a typical gym site addresses that, because the sites are written for people who already train.

What I built instead

A seven day timetable on the page, opening on today, listing every class with what it is and who it is for. No download, no app, no image of a spreadsheet.

Alongside it, the site answers the beginner question directly rather than pretending it does not exist. Beginner sessions are named and ringfenced, juniors have their own provision from age six, and the prices are on the page rather than available on request.

It opens on today

The overwhelmingly most common question is what is on tonight. Making the visitor find today in a week view is a small tax paid by every single person who visits.

Beginner sessions are marked, not implied

A class labelled as ringfenced for beginners does more for conversion than any amount of copy about a welcoming atmosphere, because it is checkable and specific rather than a claim.

Prices on the wall, and on the page

Combat gyms are notorious for prices on enquiry, which reads as we will see what you will pay. Publishing removes a reason to hesitate and it is consistent with the way the gym already operates.

The enquiry asks about experience, not just contact details

Whether someone has trained before changes which class you would put them in and what you say back to them. Asking once, in the form, saves an exchange of messages.

Coached, not supervised, stated as a distinction

It is the difference between a class and a room with mats in it, and it is the thing an experienced person is screening for while a beginner is screening for safety. One line serves both.

The seven day view is built as text, not an image

Which means a search engine can read every class name. A gym timetable is a large amount of genuinely useful, genuinely local content, and putting it in a picture throws all of it away.

The maintenance problem nobody mentions

A timetable is only an asset while it is right. The moment a class moves and the page does not, you have built something that actively misleads people into turning up to a locked door. Any gym site with a timetable needs an owner who will update it within a day of a change, and if that person does not exist, a simple honest page saying ring us for this week's classes beats a beautiful timetable that lies twice a month.